Laughter Travels

Laughter Travels

Laughter travels around the hills, up and down
the ridges and through the valleys. It reflects off
granite walls and fills the meadow with sound;
no one can know its source, for wherever you stand, you are
the center of its radius. The laughter, like atmospheric pressure,
clears the clouds and opens the sky to new possibilities.

Laughter packs no baggage, free and improvised. It is the only sound
that babies do best; unspelled and landing upon the ears like
the rainbow on a clear sky. Does their angel tickle their fancy?
Does light find its way within the child’s cheeks? Do circles
amaze her blinking eyes? Do waving trees greet him with
their limbs?

Are we the funny ones with our faces screwed up like
an old clown’s wrinkles? Are we the silliness that ignites
the chuckle, and joining in, we cackle and gurgle more
self-conscious than the tot whose face is flooded with
tears and snot by the end of the spasm that carried us all
into a forest of elves and fairies whose language, I am convinced,
is that same as babies, and exercise quite regularly their
laughter and mirth.

Hilarity lifts the weights with more power than serious convention.

And try as we might, every face in place to recreate the moment
her giggle multiplied itself up out of the windows, across the neighborhood,
past the island that sits in the middle of the river and across the state line
to Oregonian hearers who swore they heard a new bird unsung before.

Try as we might, after conducting each experiment and checking our computations,
we never discovered the word or touch or face or insect or shape or color
or smell or any other. Perhaps, and this is our favorite thesis,

when she laughed, she laughed at nothing at all.

Beyond Words

(“This is how God showed his love for us: God sent his only Son into the world so we might live through him.” 1 John 4:9)

How do you describe the endless distance of space which we call the universe? How do we fathom the long arch of time without end or beginning? How even do we understand the infinite smallness of the miniature sub-atomic particles of which the entire world is made? It takes volumes to even learn the language used by those who speak of such things.

The Path of Love

“This is the teaching you have heard from the beginning: We must love each other.” 1 John 3:11

One of my least favorite phrases is, “I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree.” Don’t get me wrong, the dislike probably has more to do with my inner psyche than the words themselves. But, on some level, it seems they usually come at the end of an argument where two people not only will not budge concerning a subject, but also attach some judgment about the other person based on that opinion.

Tiny

Tiny

(“But you are a God ready to forgive, gracious and merciful, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.” Nehemiah 9:17b)

Tiny things, visible but overlooked; soft coos,
babies sleeping in the quilted corners of our playroom.
Tiny things, heard but so submerged; round eyes,
mothers gazing at the miracle dozing underneath the adult hum.

A mom who found the man who would love her,
A dad who found the woman who never gave up;
Nine mingled children, a pair of twins included,
sing like they own the earth, play like they have all day,
love like rejection has never pinched their delight for attention,
and run to hug,
and run to hide,
and run to lay aside today’s trouble for another
chance to laugh like every day is Christmas day.

I know those families; rare. I love those couples; repaired
by hope and elongated breaths between the questions that measured
the path like mile markers up the steeps and down.

Tiny things, thoughts soak the eyes and the cheeks; soft asides,
trouble is not the enemy, conquered by hands’ light touch.
Tiny things, words painted, each name a circle; round crosses,
enclosed and warm, the fireplace glows, the moment creates

A Christmas day fond of the first; children and unlikely
parents in love and loved beyond measure.

Tiny things, like babes in the straw, changed our images,
our dances, our carols and our wintry reasons for the day.

Soul is Face, Black is Red

Soul is Face, Black is Red

(“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.” 1 John 1:9)

Sometimes the wind turns offshore and insists
on another whiff of trails I have left behind me.
Another note I played half flat, another name I forgot,
and more than that, could not remember the connection
we certainly once had.

Sometimes the circuits are crowded and
emails are never answered. I wished for days,
hoped for weeks, waited for months, now despair
over the years that my misspoken and slippery tongue
cannot be forgiven by the one who misheard my intention.
(I do not blame your hearing; it is my speak that
shorted out like a light switch with the wiring worn away.)

I have heard the words from men over the phone,
no tears, no cracks in the armor of their voice,
only the admission they couldn’t break the sickness
until they sent apologies. (Never mind my wounds
and splinter bed, or tears spread everywhere I thought
about the next blast of angry flame. I forgave,
nevertheless, though, as I’ve said, I wished you hadn’t
continued to blame me for days, weeks and months after
you called so you could recover from your cold.)

My old soul is black from its youth,
my thoughts are intractable,
my actions driven and drunk from
the impulses that only serve to break my boredom.

My face is red from effort and embarrassment,
and my feet slide upon the incline littered with
lava’s gravel; my pace is unknown.

I am open, having stolen words from poets;
I am guilty, having spoken lies to prophets;
I am filthy, having broken vows to comrades:
I am captive, having pursued praise from patrons.

I am free, completely above the inactive plains
of stone-cold lava flow. I am clean, entirely within
the passion and pains of momentary composition.

The river is sweeter than the peak I pretended to conquer,
and the pretence that nearly conquered me.

The Weight of a Grudge

“So Esau hated Jacob because of the blessing his father had given to his brother. Esau said privately, ‘The time of mourning for my father is near; then I will kill my brother Jacob!’” Genesis 27:41

“Carrying a grudge” is a fitting way to describe what happens when we are so offended that all we can think of is leveling the score. We pick up the offense in the morning as we rehearse the hurt along with our morning coffee. We carry on imaginary conversations with the offender as we drive to work, probably repeating the same arguments over and over again. We take the grudge into bed with us. After the weariness of carrying such weight around all day, we do not even lay it down to sleep. We allow its weight to press down upon our minds, keeping sleep at bay while the grudge grunts through our thoughts like an angry bull.

No More "I Can't"

“By his divine power, God has given us everything we need for living a godly life. We have received all of this by coming to know him, the one who called us to himself by means of his marvelous glory and excellence.” 2 Peter 1:3

Two of the most deadly words in the English language are “I can’t.” We limit our options, we subtract possible joy and, saddest of all, we do not make room for God and His gifts. That is not to say that we can, in some fairy tale way, have three (or more) wishes and obtain anything we want. I cannot, for instance, suddenly be fit and muscular if I have been sedentary and listless until that point. But, what I am able to do is begin a pathway toward that goal.

Are Enduring

Are Enduring

(“Resist him, strong in your faith, because you know that your brothers and sisters throughout the world are enduring the same kinds of suffering.” 1 Peter 5:9)

Blankets and clothing,
baby cloths and netting,
what can I give for the suffering;
what can I do for the hunted left out in the storm?

Food banks and free dresses,
toy donations and grandchild kisses,
what does it mean so close to me;
what can I do when most of me is spent on
another trinket the in-crowd on tv insisted would
change my life, make me free, and give me all the love
and company a man could ever ask for. I would change the
car I drive
if I had the money.

Until one mother calls me to give her child a ride home,
you see, practice will go past nine tonight and it is far too
late for a young teen to walk home even our little hamlet.
“She would walk, otherwise,” I promise, the mother almost
apologized…and I stopped her. “Of course she can have a ride.”

I would change the car I drive
except for families I know
that don’t possess even one.

Boxes of underwear, schoolbooks and pencils,
a hand-drawn mural for the school-wall from eight little
children in Sunday School that only know
some others as tiny as they are scared of halls that once
felt so safe.

All they know, and I know, is Jesus gave. My garage has boxes
filled with things I haven’t seen in a decade. My life is too crowded
to keep from filling a hole somewhere that lets in far too much winter air.

Scorched and Skillful

Scorched and Skillful

(“God was kind to us and had them send a skillful man named Sherebiah.” Ezra 8:18a)

The prairie was a wide putting green unwatered through the winter,
and crumbled bumps plowed weeds and wheat encircled the lot where
a few dozen hoped to raise a simple box of a building; gray and white
on the outside;
earth-tones within: forest green carpet with lines and leaves and branches
barely visible in the background underfoot,
adobe pink walls that dimmed to sandstone under the soft light,
white cathedral ceiling training the eye upward hoping for the
nonverbal
“ah”

Of comfort and reverence.

Ten years previous a parsonage sat on the same prairie
75 miles southeast. In an oasis of evergreens, and one night unoccupied,
current does what current does, taking the path of least resistance across
two wires with frayed insulation. Scorched, angry embers
blew from room to room, up bearing walls to ceiling tiles, only
to fall, a flat pancake of coal, square upon our 2 year old angel’s crib.

Non were hurt, nearly all was lost, and we had little to rebuild
lives we thought had dived into a crater lake of the unknown.

The prairie is a fair example; latest fall when brown lies upon brown,
gray dirt blows into gray dust bowls sometimes taking the tops of
storage sheds or mobile homes. That’s why they tie salvaged truck tires
to weight the light houses down.

Scorched, so the hairs on our arms curled up and singed,
eyebrows indiscernible, skin red, then purples as days progressed.

Scorched, so the memory turned a determined talent
into trade. Maybe the scars on the arms, the ache on the legs
are all the interpretation of Scripture one man needed to
point a living way over the piles of embers to the pains
of those who remember much the same. We remain
scarred, but, stepping out of the rubble into the next
man’s trouble
we are healing while…
we remain scarred.

We Need You, Prince of Peace

“Ezra was determined to study the Lord’s Teachings, live by them, and teach their rules and regulations in Israel.” Ezra 7:10

Today 20 children were shot and killed by a crazed man in a Connecticut elementary school. They dead are primarily kindergarten students, plus the shootist’s mother who was a teacher at the school. Not a week before a man opened fire in a shopping mall, killing two and taking his own life as well. Nearly 10,000 were in the mall at the time of the shooting.

Peace and Goodwill

Peace and Goodwill

“Glory to God in highest heaven, and peace on earth to those with whom God is pleased.” Luke 2:14

It was the middle of the night; the sky was the purple black that appears once no remnants of the setting sun are left. It is dotted with starry points of light, and quiet. It was the time of night very few experience; either because they are sleeping, or are safe and warm within their homes. But, the few times we have lingered outside, far away from city lights and far past midnight, we understand the magical quiet and peace which that hour of darkness can possess.

Endowment Plus

Endowment Plus

(“Therefore, with minds that are alert and fully sober, set your hope on the grace to be brought to you when Jesus Christ is revealed at his coming.” 1 Peter 1:13)

He improvised a dance that delighted starlight,
steps unseen, light and pristine, with backdrops falling
like crystal confetti like vapor trails behind each leap and twirl.

He synthesized the structure which his muscles had memorized
in practice in private, before no one’s eyes. The mirrors were his
only judges, the note-beat-touch synchronized so well his body
met the music head-on and passed through it like liquid;
fluid and precise.

So when prompted to perform by the impromptu crowd,
he flashed the confidence of a thousand repetitions and
leapt upon their suggestion, a deer careening across the
evergreen brush like everyman walking home a completely
new direction. He did not fear the pauses,
and landed like prism light opening up the sun.

Only the closest few, the three, perhaps four, knew
the repeat completions he turned to perfection in the
quiet late and blurry early when no applause would be heard;
only the slow breath of one unhurried to string each unit
a symphony of movement;

While we watched, embarrassed into thinking he
never had danced this way before. While we watched,
commenting of born talent and gifts; silly and jealous
about genetics without

Learning the secret of repeating that turns effort
to effortless; endowment plus preparation.

Larger than Fulfillment

Larger than Fulfillment

(“Be patient, therefore, dear friends, until the coming of the Lord. Note how the farmer waits for the precious harvest of the earth, being patient for it until it receives the early and latter rains.” James 5:7)

Stranded midair between the conception and completion
is the day we swallow our food without tasting, drink wine in gulps
and count every miscue that needs resolution to bring ourselves
to perfection.

Better to watch the rain as the red-hooded woodpecker, ignorant
of our project,
finds his food rounding the gray wafered bark of autumn’s late tree.

But our count is incomplete, our uncertainty competing with
the movie we produced in our memory before we ever began.
Now, halfway through, there is a quarter done,
and, without a time-bending solution, we will land far short;
proving the fact we should have started much earlier,
or scripted something shorter than our ambition imagined
inking open the first page and day.

Associates do not return calls; texts fly out, competing for space
with radio waves. They are late, they always say. They forgot,
conveniently mistaken. They would have told us yesterday
but (the writer apologizes, but cannot think of a worthy excuse
to follow the previous phrase. Excuse, please, the inability to
complete the thought). Stranded midair, yesterday hums like
a record sung backwards and texts never answered.

Better to what the river run with logs and branches from
upstream’s overflow riding the brown water. Better to see
geese overhead with silhouetted wings against the charcoal sky.

Better to take the next step grounded, and finish today what
yesterday started with dreams larger than fulfillment. I’ve seen
the day change in a moment and clouds split at the most
unexpected break in time.

And So He Prospered

“He sought his God and worked wholeheartedly. And so he prospered.” 2 Chronicles 31:21

Hezekiah, about whom this verse is written, was one of the godliest kings of Judah. He restored much of the temple and Passover practices, motivated out of deep devotion to God. This verse sums all it up by telling us that he prospered as a result of this wholehearted love.

Me and My Models

“Don’t just listen to the word. You fool yourselves if you do that. You must do what it says.” James 1:22

I loved model planes and cars as a young boy. That is to say, I loved the idea of assembling them so they would look just as wonderful as the picture on the box. I loved biplanes, and I also lived in Southern California during the “funny car” era of drag racing. So, those were my two primary choices, plus the one odd Plymouth Barracuda. I chose it because favorite teacher drove one, although reverse didn’t work. He had to always park in a way that could drive straight out.

One Side to the Other

One Side to the Other

(“But endurance must do its complete work, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking nothing.” James 1:4)

Moving, I am told, one side of the head to the other,
the sounds of sea, a step into the river
can rip the loops apart that repeat the hurting tracks
over and over, D.C al without Fine; and find the chord
which resolves the pain.

The child still cries (he is nearly 60) at the angry hands
that red imprints that faded quicker than the picture stuck
in his brain. The soldier shakes (he is home now) at the shells
and mortar that nearly ripped his barracks and comrades; it
was just the neighbor shutting his car door.

For those who remember vinyl long-play with scratches
that sounded like wax paper crumpled beneath the hi-fi,
the needle sticks in a groove deeper than the rest
and won’t let the two bars finish, won’t let the 3 ½ words
complete, the over and the over and the over and the ove

er and

We are brains and we are minds, we are spirit and we are muscle,
we are wired hard and scratched by misuse; we are puzzles not yet
assembled, we are garage sale jigsaw puzzles bought on faith that
all the pieces are present.

I am told there is music in the spheres, truer than the rewinds
our past lives have struck into our casting; and moving, one
side of hearing to the other,
we may find the lines rewritten, circuits rewired,
memories of smitten hopes soothed by the chords and words
written before the hands that brought affliction.

Endure to the end, the story which sings its death and sting
rises to release us from the refrain we’ve repeated to the verses
of life Christ created for each ditch, scratch and vein we
thought each blow had depleted.

Endurance

“Endure until your testing is over. Then you will be mature and complete, and you won’t need anything.” James 1:4

We usually hear this verse quoted something like this: “Let patience have its perfect work.” I think most of us perceive “patience” as non-active, letting life just sweep by, or sweep us along, while we do nothing on our part to advance. Even the idea of “enduring” can evoke thoughts of sitting in a foxhole, taking shot after shot, just waiting for the bad guys to stop firing at us.

The Quiet Unspeak

The Quiet Unspeak

(“Do not let the love of money control your life. Be satisfied with what you have. God himself has said, ‘I will never be away from you. I will never leave you alone.'” Hebrews 13:5)

Content upon the rocky banks that overlook
the same river that ran here yesterday; my eyes
still see the island obstructing the view of
Oregon and the cargo ships slowly up-channel
beyond it. It has misted since early morning,
even during the short peeks the sun makes
tricking my expectations of an uncommon dry day.

Within the next hour, though, same place, same
slippery rocks, green island and river view;
I fetch undue anxiety from the same air I breathed
so serenely before. Quiet now is not the same
as quiet then.

I am a kettle just before the boil; a miniature
weather warning, the siren ready to blow.
The quiet unspeak is the sleepy gravity
that is on the verge of blowing the roof off
the 50 year shingles 49-years-old.

If not for the promise, if not for provision,
if not for my Father’s love and precision
that bids me quiet like the morning and
take the pot off the boil. He will, I know,
do what all good Father’s do and calm me
long, teach me longer the relaxation I should know:

The river, the slit sky, the treed island and rocky banks
are never caught off guard by my visits; hustling to
adjust the river’s flow back east to west. And so,
Father of it all, my hope below is quiet in respite
before dawn or under a covered sun.